Another Chance To Say "Thank You"

                                                                                                                                                            Today is Go Red For Women Day, organized by the American Heart Association to call attention to women's heart health.  Women and men are rocking red clothing today, whether one item or an entire outfit.  Wearing red is a symbolic statement encouraging people to learn the symptoms of heart disease and how to improve your heart health. Heart disease is no respecter of gender, race or even age.  We hear more stories of youngsters with heart disease, and sometimes with fatal outcomes.  Women think that they aren't at risk if they are thin, exercise regularly and eat right.  That's just not so.  We are a nation of too many diabetic and obese people - but that's not news.  Women's heart disease is too often undiagnosed because women don't focus on the warning signs, or put off being concerned about their health until later.   We don't all get to 'later'.  Too many women die of heart attacks and heart disease because they ignored their bodies saying "There's trouble here, time to get it checked out!"   

My body sent that message on two different occasions in 2009.  The first time was on Easter Sunday, while rushing around town to take care of some last-minute requests before an event at church.  The palpitations had been going on for a little while, and after I ran back into the store for a case of water, I passed out in the checkout line.  Not once, but twice, because after I came to I insisted that I was fine and got back in line to pay for the water.  After I dropped the second time, the paramedics came and even then I was insisting that I was okay and didn't need any help.  One of the paramedics gently told me that my heart was beating a little too fast to be considered 'okay'.  Please take note: when they inject you twice with a drug to stop your racing heartbeat, you're not okay.  Especially when the drugs don't seem to have any effect.  So we went to the hospital, but I "fell through the cracks" of the evening shift change and received minimal attention for the first four hours of my stay in the ER.  (I left just before midnight, hungry, frustrated and disgusted.  If I'm suspected of having a silent heart attack, how is it that the doctor on duty for the last four hours that I was there never came into the room to see me - just across the hall from the nursing station?)  Healthcare is not an option - but that's another blog topic. 

The second time was on July 2nd, after the funeral of a dear sister friend who had died of heart disease the previous week.  I was still at the church, working on a project, feeling bad and pushing through.  But again the message was pounding loudly in my chest, and when the paramedics came there was no discussion about going, just where to go.  While sitting in the ER bed that night, waiting for the IV to finish so that I could go home, the doctor came back and told me that the only place I was going was to a bed upstairs because they had run more tests and knew something was wrong, but not specifically what had happened.  She mentioned Silent Heart Attack, whose symptoms differ in men and women.  That time, in Olympia Medical Center, the cavalry was in place.  They started tests the next morning at 6:30 a.m., called in the cardiologist, who called in the cardio specialist.   Thank God for the episode that I had in the hospital while attached to the monitors because that helped the doctors with the diagnosis.  They made a plan and we made a date for surgery. 

One week after going home, I went to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles for an angiogram and a coronary ablation.  The angiogram showed that my arteries were clean.  The ablation was partly successful because I had residue of a heart medicine in my bloodstream, so the next month I went back to the hospital for a second ablation.  No open-heart incisions, no long scars. Surgery through catheters, home the next day.  How amazing is that!  Now nearly five months later, twenty-three pounds lighter, taking a nightly mile walk with my nine-pound, four-legged 'trainer' and just a nightly cholesterol pill, I beg you one and all to 1) learn the symptoms of heart attack and stroke, to 2) learn CPR if you haven't already taken a course, and to 3) tell every woman that you know to speak up when they feel bad.  We need to be superwomen and superdivas with healthy hearts!!   Take the time to make healthy eating choices, take part in regular exercise and share the weight of the world with others (stress will knock you down and can take you out).  Treat yourself as well as you treat your loved ones.  See your doctor regularly, and tell your doctor about the aches, pains, flutters or whatever it is that just doesn't feel right. 

God bless health professionals, healthcare workers and first responders for the work that they do.  To honor the memories of all of the women who did not survive heart disease or heart attacks, we have to make our health a priority in our lives.  Today is a great day to prioritize your heart health, woman or man, girl or boy.   For more information, visit http://www.americanheart.org/

Red love to you!!

                                                                                                                                                                
The Window Seat by Karen Caffee is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at www.karencaffee.com.

Tenth Day Checkup, and a Four Month Challenge

Today was the ten-day checkup after the heart surgery. It still feels funny to write or say 'surgery' when there are no incisions, staples or sutures, but it is what it is. I love going to my cardiologist's office on the top floor of the medical office tower. He has a nice view of the Hollywood hills, and can look immediately over at the Beverly Center. There are two doctors and two other staff members, and they are all so pleasant. I always feel like I'm too happy/loud when I'm there. Today I sounded loud because I am feeling so well, and his pronouncement (echoing mine) that he fixed the problem was what I have been waiting to hear. The bruising at the catheter sites should be gone soon, and I am now done with the daily baby aspirin, which follows the end of the daily heart pill by two weeks. A nightly cholesterol pill is still on the schedule.

My next cardio appointment is in four months, when we'll see how much weight I have lost. Will I lose 10% of my current weight in order to stop taking the statin, or will I reach my personal goal which is more than that because I miss my high heels and it's time to do this? Is this vanity? Yes, somewhat because I love heels, but most importantly I know when I feel comfortable with my body, and I am out of the comfort zone! I'll have quite a lot to update my primary care internist about during the annual physical (and she'll be looking to see what progress I have made).  And I am looking forward to the next "Go Red For Women Day" in February! 

Before I get to that visit, I'll be stopping in to see a certain downtown hospital's administrators to show them how much better I am thanks to proper emergency room care and a proper diagnosis. And while I'm there, we're going to discuss the outrageous bill that they sent me for letting me sit mostly unattended in their ER for 6.25 hours! Their patient load has apparently doubled after the closing of another South Los Angeles hospital. I fell through the cracks in ER during shift change (what a nurse actually said to me) and fortunately survived to get sick again.

My adventures through the healthcare maze this year have given me plenty of inspiration to speak out daily for national healthcare reform. Sen. Edward Kennedy called it "the cause of my life", and thankfully his passion for this cause translated into coverage and coverage provisions for some that now must be made available to all American citizens. There is no other way for me to describe how I feel besides saying that I know that I am blessed to have medical insurance at this time in my life, and in the life of our country. Too many people are without, people that I know and people that I will never know.

I pray that the discussions among congressional leaders in the wake of Senator Kennedy's passing will lead to effective legislation in this session that can go through both houses of Congress and then to the president's desk. You bet that there needs to be some major action on cleaning out the fraudsters and cheaters in all of the healthcare pipelines; the money lost to fraud alone could have been used to provide coverage to how many citizens before now! Many of us (I know I'm in this group) can start up or step up the exercise routines to improve or maintain our health. The President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports (http://www.fitness.gov/) has an online Adult Fitness Test. I have not taken the test yet, but it would undoubtedly tell me to hit the gym - already on my updated agenda!

Meanwhile, I raise my sweet tea cup in salute and say a heartfelt 'thank you' to Dr. Arshia Noori and his office, to the wonderful staff at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, to the wonderful staff at Olympia Medical Center who realized that there was a problem in July, and to the Los Angeles Fire Department's rolling angels. The LAFD responders and paramedics realized that I might have big problems and scooped me up twice, and I'd want them on my side any day. They are the bridge many times for underinsured and uninsured in the city. I've seen them in action on a daily basis when I worked on Skid Row (that's a post all by itself). All of these people rose to the call and helped me to get to this tenth-day visit, and for that I am now and will be forever grateful.

I am also grateful to Sen. Kennedy, whose quiet diligence and bipartisan spirit were the impetus that resulted in some of the services and resources that we enjoy today. May he rest in peace. May we continue the work.


                                                                                                                                                                    
The Window Seat by Karen Caffee is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at www.karencaffee.com.